Band videos coming

Well hello. There are no gigs for a while and i've been busy trying out imovie on my mac. I have made a few videos for you to have a gander at. All the recordings are taken from live shows and they weren't recorded for this purpose so it's not what you hear out front, but it gives you a flavour I hope. There is a special one made up of fans pics too. (Yes you people featured on the blog!!)

The videos can be found at

http://www.youtube.com/user/inthefleshuk

Basfest 2010

Welcome to Chris' BLOG

Well as Polly wasn’t able to join us for the weekend so she asked me if I would take over the Blog duties. So welcome to Chris’s Blog.

Just to add to our show at High Wycombe I had a little altercation with a traffic Warden after they had ticketed one of our vehicles. Apparently when the Theatre was built the local council bought the surrounding land and left only one space on the Theatre ramp for cars! Bearing in mind that most touring companies turn up with more than one car it seems like a nice little earner for the local council. Suffice to say I won’t be sending them a Christmas card.

Apart from that it was a great night and met lots of nice people including our new Sax player Harriet Baker, great job on her first show.

This brings me to our day off at ‘Povey Towers’. Our Manager had kindly offered to put the remaining band members up for the weekend prior to our show at Basfest on Sunday afternoon. Steve, Jeff, Paul and I were thoroughly entertained by our managers fine hospitality and thought the arranged trip to the Sunday market was a real insight into how the other half live.

Later into the day the BBQ was fired into action, not before Steve and Jeff fell asleep watching the football, and we had a full on meat fest with Jeff’s home made burgers, which were not all that bad!

During the day we felt is was our duty to send photo’s to Patch as we didn’t want him to feel left out.

Paul BBQ Chef

Steve and Jeff watching the football

Glenn and Chris

Good nights sleep and off to Basildon for BASFEST 2010!!!.

Well to be honest I didn’t know what to expect and was pleasantly surprised when we turned up. It was a lot bigger that I was expecting and very sunny. These were Perfect festival conditions. This festival was well organised and all the staff and stewards I met were great so credit to you guys.

The only problem I had was the Hammond. Due to the fact the Hammond organ realise on a 230 volt supply to give the Hammond the correct frequency to run at concert pitch, when the generators 240 volts went in so the pitch went up and I had an organ which was about a semi tone sharp!! Didn’t sound to good I can tell you.Fortunately Patch was on his way, sporting very nice straw trilby, with my digital organ and saved the day. Phew!

We played a new hour1/2 set, which was well received by the crowd of several thousand, oh and the stage sound was loud, real loud. I thought my head was going to implode at one point.

We had a great laugh and Ross joined us on Sax, which was a real pleasure.

Quote of the day, ‘ C’MON, LET ME SEE YOUR HANDS’ priceless.

I conclude that I love the festival atmosphere although I feel this will change the next time we do one in the rain! Lets hope that never happens. More festivals for next summer, may I suggest a facebook group ‘In the Flesh for Glastonbury 2011’.

So I hope I have done this blog justice and that you continue to keep up with the band, All the best.

Chris. x

Crowd before

Crowd during!

Here is a clip I have been sent from onstage at Basfest.

Here's one for the blog. This is Glenn and Janes dog Buzz getting over friendly with my leg.....all part of the Povey hospitality package.....ha ha

from Steve

High Wycombe Friday 2nd July 2010

Well the first thing of note was that the minibus van wouldn't start. So I was ready at 9.30 and then checked my phone to see that they were still in Brixham. 2 hours later and a lot of faffing and time wasting on my part I met the vans. The indicators were on strike so there was some good old fashioned arm signalling on the motorway. Chris and Jeff worked well as a team on the left arm signal!

Oh the hilarity with the wig. Please note the placing of Chris' hand in this pic, you are not imagining things, there was a cheeky squeeze!

Disappointing amount of pics taken today. Oh well, I just wasn't feeling snap happy. Here is Harriet Baker, our dep for Ross, (and a previous student of his) She was fab and it was nice to have another girl with me in my dressing room.

Here is a little feature on young Zac, Alan his Dad is obviously a big floyd fan and has seen us before but brought Zac along this time. This young man had a huge grin and when I asked him what he thought of the show he just beamed and said 'amazing'!

Zac and Me

Here is Zac with Chris (think he looks more impressed being next to Chris!)

Zac with Dad Alan

Here's three friendly fellas, who I asked to be on the blog.

This brother and sister combo were helping sell the merchandising.

I didn't write down their names, I shall find out from Wendy and update!!

The Princess Theatre, Torquay 19th June 2010

Back on home turf, way hay! It was strange to think we had played in the pub just down the road from the theatre only 18 months ago. I arrived later than usual as had been rehearsing with my theatre group, I had my mum and sister with me, (my entourage as I called them) we made tea and coffee and then we waited for the choir to arrive for sound check, During the usual faffing about I got asked to take the following pictures (posers!)!

The 'not very long' adventures of Jeffy And Patchy

HA HA HA!!

THE END!

After a long winded sound check, I got quite excited at the prospect of having our family and friends watching.

Show started and I wasn't even nervous, I just felt totally at home on the stage tonight. Here is me and Fredi in a moody blue, I like this pic!

My fav moment

General shot from the audience

Thanks to my friend Alan Miller for sneakily taking the show photos above! Good job or I'd have had no record of the TAF choir who sang brick in the wall..... here comes the SHAMELSS PLUG (which were from my Theatre school Torbay Acting Factory!)(6-18yrs after school group for Singing, Dancing and Acting!!) (www.torbayactingfactory.com)

Here they are in all their attitudey finery!

Special mention to Dan the only lad (the other 3 dropped out on the day!)

Here is Anna, wearing Garys home made T shirt, these guys travelled a long way to see us, and stayed in the travel lodge in Torquay, It meant a lot to see you guys, I was looking out for you, finally spotted you in the balcony.

This guy seemed rather taken with Fredi, who wouldn't be huh?

'Miss Torbay 2010' I'll have you know...

My family and friends, thanks so much for coming!!! (the young guy with his eyes closed behind is not part of my lot btw!)

Fredi's family and friends (Tom her boyf with the big grin behind!)

Thats all from Torquay, we've got a couple weeks off now, so will be back blogging again after High Wycombe 2nd July.

Mirupafshim (goodbye in Albanian!)

The Alban Arena, St Albans 17th June 2010

Hello everyone!

Having had a 3 weeks off, it was nice to be back on the road although I was supremely bored on the journey up.. There were only 3 of us in our van, Jeff, Chris and Me. Fredi was coming up after her exam with Paul our sound man.

It was about 5 miles away from the venue that it started to feel familiar and then I asked if we had played here before to be told YES! I had really forgotten, isn't that bad? about a year ago apparently.. When i got there it all came back to me. the green room space etc.. the stage door. The very echoey stairs up to the stage - good for practising with some natural reverb!!

I didn't take many pictures actually, how very lazy of me!

The Alban Arena

The most exciting part of the show was that we were to have Ross on saxophones for the first time, well not the first time actually....... This leads me to me trip down memory lane!! ........... (cue wobbly music like they do in rubbish programmes when it's a flash back scene!!)

Now for those who don't know, back in the day in Torbay there was a band called Dr Frank, made up of a group of school boys from the different local schools. The line up was

Vocals - Chris Thomas (Whats he doing again? lol)

Guitar -Barney Dine (Now fronting a band who is supporting Will Young this summer in The Devon Festival)

Saxophone - Ross Purves

Bass Guitar - Jan Tribble (now an architect)

Trumpet and Keyboards - Mikey Taylor (now touring with Joseph)

Drums - Jeff Glover (hands as he's now known!)

Now I remember doing a few pink floyd songs even back then, can't remember which ones

There were a few band changes over the years, I even did a stint as a backing singer but I was pretty unconfident at this point. I remember doing a few pink floyd songs even back then, can't remember which ones. They were extremely popular with all the young people in the area and looking back they really were good! I will try to dig out an old picture!!

After a stint in London they went there separate ways, Jeff and Chris stayed together and eventually formed a new band with.....

Guitar - Steve Loar

Bass -Patrick Forbear.

(sounding familiar?)

These guys were called 'Starskey' and played the circuit for many many years. Functions Weddings and pubs.

Steve went to Spain for a while to live where i'm told he would still play the old set to himself on his guitar just to keep the memory alive! He couldn't stand it and thankfully he came back again and took up where they left off.

A mere 10 years or so on! A few floyd songs came into the set and were going down well. The band then got asked to headline the Brixham Happenin festival in 2007 (?). Feeling they needed some backing vocals, Chris turned to me and asked if I was up for it and did I know anyone else, I called Audra and we did a show in the at the Happenin, with the Brixham people dancing around in the field in the rain, jut like glastonbury! ha cough! I gathered together a choir of kids from my youth theatre to be the brick in the wall kids. We played a mix of songs, originals, covers and finished with a few floyd numbers including comfortably numb!

I disappeared to Egypt for the summer and when I returned the band had decided to go full time with the floyd stuff, Audra was on backing vocals and when the theatres started coming in I joined up again as second BV!... 2 years on and we're going strong, the family atmosphere has got stronger and even though there have been a few changes we've made it through the other side. Which brings me back to Ross paying on saxophones again after oooh about 15 years or so.

He was really genuinely pleased to be playing us, and he did a brilliant job after 1 run through with the band in sound check!!

Here's Ross

Ok so back to the show. It was being filmed this evening by ESL (event sound and light) who also do our lights for the shows. The purpose of the filming is to have some clips for you tube and promote the show so when it's out I will let you know (if you don't find out some other way) and then you can all share it with your friends and get them to come watch us too!!!!

Steve - Restringing his guitar summer shorts style!!

After the show we met two lovely people 'Jayne and Richard', I believe they have written on the website guest book too! They are big floyd fans and we had a good gossip about the show they went to in Welwyn Garden City recently. Jayne told me she reads my blog and said it was a bit like reality television, really good to see what goes on behind the scenes and that she feels like she knows the band from all the stories. My counter said that not many people have visited the blog lately so I was a bit disheartened, I think maybe it is wrong cos a lot of people say they read it. If you do, come and let me know after a show as it keeps me going!! Hence this super long entry!

Au revoir! xx

Chesham and Weston Super Mare

The Elgiva Theatre, Chesham 27th May 2010

When putting in postcode to sat nav we found a road name in Chesham called bottom lane and so we went on a magical mystery tour with the sat nav to find it. It was down many wind roads. Eventually we found it and here is the photo result. Look away if easily offended!!

The venue from outside today

During the show, lots of people came in after we had started and as the seats were mainly taken they had to stand on the outside edges..

There were a lot of younguns there this evening. Saw a girl (maybe 11yr?) in a sparky bolero like me, swaying, in a similar style to me, I secretly hoped she was copying me. Her face lit up when we played Brick in the wall. Parents must be huge floyd fans!

Everyone seemed very relaxed on stage, couple band members were throwing some shapes, seeing if they could get in some muscle poses when they weren't lit to amuse each other. Apparently they did it through my Great Gig, I had no idea as I go off to my own little world anyway..

Lots of nice comments afterwards and very friendly people!

The Playhouse Weston Super Mare 28th May 2010

The pier was shut! - boo!

Tonights gig was mostly about the T SHIRT for me! Gary and Anna our old blog friends, were there. Gary had had a T shirt made up with the words 'I follow Pollys blog on it' HOW COOL IS THAT!!

Here it is after the show!

100% Effort!

Craig (from Torbay) and his mates were there also, so had a picture with them. Here me with them

Here's Fredi's folks who dropped her off for the show.

2 nice kids came and asked for our signatures. Megan and Alistair, here they are by the merchandising stand after the show.

Some high 5'ing on the move was practised during sound check!

During wish you were here Jon on lights threw a muscle pose at us from the back, wasn't expecting it so had to try not to laugh.

Fareham, Worthing, Welwyn Garden City, Tring

Thursday 20th May 2010

Started off the journey with some smoke coming out of the wheels coming down Telegraph hill. Paul was under that van in a flash. We decided to carry on anyway (not with Paul under it mind you) and blame it on the braking down the hill and heavy load.


First stop off was in Fareham, Farenham Hall.

There was a huge green room upstairs with lots of dressing rooms off it. There was much toasted sandwich making. There was a load of nonsense with the projector AGAIN!

The one good thing to come out of it is that I have learnt what key stoning means. Jon took the camera and took some mighty fine pictures. I shall let him loose again!

Also the devil plectrum I mentioned in previous post was out during sound check..

Few shots from the show that night, courtesy of Jon.

Friday 21st May
The next day we took a stop off in Arundel which was nearby. Lovely castle, we wanted to look around but didn't have any time, chatted to the tour guide at the front gate. Funnily enough someone later at gig said to chris that he had seen us at the castle and knew we were 'in the flesh'. Better look a bit more decent in the mornings from now on!

We had a walk around the outside of castle and there was a stream, and lots of ducks. Here is one I managed to get close to.

Got to Worthing, the stage had two tiers to it so me and Patch went on top level. Jeff went centre stage with the other two either side, bit different!

Ticket sales had practically doubled in the last week which was a bonus. Good show, (nice high 10 from Jeff and Patch at the end)

Jeff insisted this head band (made of bits cut off the arm of one of the band t shirts was cool! hmmm)

Saturday 22nd May 2010

Stayed near gatwick airport overnight, the next morning chris was late to the van so we stood and watched planes taking off. Sounds pretty dull but my word there were men camped out with flasks of coffee with massive cameras there too!

Paul came out with his boots on the wrong way round - the numpty, he'd had a bit of a crazy night the night before.

Pig was feeling the heat.

Drove to third venue, this was Welwyn Garden city. I asked if the 'Garden' bit meant it was very green to be told no i don't think so, but it darn well was! full of trees and very beautiful After the third show it was all starting to blend into one. The set up the tea and coffee making etc blah blah blah, manager Glenn was there which was different however and we all had breakfast in what I thought was a wetherspoons but turned out to not be. It was super dooper sunny so I made a little blanket and cushion arrangement outside the stage door! Had to keep coming inside to cool off!
note to self, strange eery silence during show.

Campus West, Welwyn Garden City from stage

Steves Jimi Hendrix Tattoo

Last of the 4 shows was Tring

Pretty pretty town,

There was much sun bathing and chasing fish around a pond, thats all I have to say on the matter.

Liked this sign in the cafe we had brekkie in.